May 30, 2014 (Google bows to EU privacy ruling)
BENTON'S COMMUNICATIONS-RELATED HEADLINES for FRIDAY, MAY 30, 2014
More on the Future of Broadband Regulation at the FCC http://benton.org/calendar/2014-05-30/
INTERNET/BROADBAND/TELECOM
Building on the Community Broadband Momentum - NTIA press release
NTCA: Rural Telecom Providers See 72% Take Rates on Broadband
Connect Minnesota Releases New Broadband Availability Figures - press release [links to web]
House adopts proposal to halt Internet oversight shift
House Dems fight back on measure to hamstring Internet oversight shift [links to web]
Tech industry pushes lawmakers to fund Internet oversight shift [links to web]
Rep Latta Introduces Legislation to Keep Internet Open and Accessible - press release
YouTube starts rating US ISPs, puts its weight behind settlement-free peering
Hastings: Comcast wants to become the 'post office'
Urbana-Champaign Big Broadband makes deal to widen fiber network
DirecTV and Don Draper in a ‘Life After Television’ world - AEI op-ed [links to web]
Verizon Responds to the FCC: Fiber is Better, Even for POTS - press release
VoIP Impairment, Failure, and Restrictions - research
SPECTRUM/WIRELESS
More Emergency Centers Are Gearing Up to Receive 911 Texts
Chairmen Upton and Walden Seek Clarification of Statute to Advance Wireless Broadband - press release
Deutsche Telekom Willing to Keep Stake in T-Mobile-Sprint Tie-Up
China Is Projected to Overtake the US in Mobile Revenue [links to web]
Artemis Makes Tiny Internet Cells to Dodge Interference [links to web]
TELEVISION/RADIO
Sinclair Proposes Surrendering Three Licenses to Gain Allbritton Deal Approval
Statement of Commissioners Ajit Pai and Michael O'Rielly on the Negative Impact of the Decision to Restrict Television Stations' Use of Joint Sales Agreements - press release
The Comcast Way: First, Kill PEG Television - American Community Television press release
MMTC Presses Case At FCC For Multilingual EAS [links to web]
PRIVACY/SECURITY
Root backdoor found in surveillance gear used by law enforcement
Report: One in seven US consumers notified of personal data breaches in 2013 [links to web]
GOVERNMENT & COMMUNICATIONS
The Constitution Project Calls for Strong Public Representative at Terror Court - press release
JOURNALISM
Hashtag journalism - analysis
LABOR
Google Diversity Data Pressures Silicon Valley to Change
Google, Silicon Valley must do more to hire female engineers - op-ed
State of the art: Women call few of film's digital shots [links to web]
Only 1 in 10 workers had to be licensed in 1970. Today it's closer to 1 in 3 [links to web]
Should You Need A License To Practice Cybersecurity? [links to web]
The Link Between STEM Training and Civil Rights [links to web]
CONTENT
Digital music services like Pandora would pay more under proposed “Oldies” law [links to web]
YouTube sensation Lindsey Stirling on how the Internet can shape the music industry [links to web]
Why Is Amazon Squeezing Hachette? Maybe It Really Needs the Money - analysis [links to web]
EDUCATION
The Future Of Online Ed Isn't Heading Where You Expect [links to web]
Statement of Commissioner Ajit Pai on Broadband's Impact on Schools and Libraries in South Dakota - press release [links to web]
HEALTH
New PCAST Report Says “Systems Engineering” Can Improve Health Care - press release [links to web]
RESEARCH
Research funding bill made less awful, but still guts social sciences [links to web]
Scientists Report Finding Reliable Way to Teleport Data [links to web]
STORIES FROM ABROAD
Google bows to EU privacy ruling
Turkey's Top Court Rules YouTube Ban is Unconstitutional [links to web]
Director of ‘Happy in Tehran’ Video Is Reportedly Freed [links to web]
Online Chats Between Sexes Denounced in Saudi Arabia [links to web]
MORE ONLINE
Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg pledges $120 million to help struggling Bay Area schools [links to web]
INTERNET/BROADBAND/TELECOM
BUILDING ON THE COMMUNITY BROADBAND MOMENTUM
[SOURCE: National Telecommunications and Information Administration, AUTHOR: Lawrence Strickling]
The National Telecommunications and Information Administration is hosting the first of several workshops focused on community broadband as we explore ways to build on the momentum of our successful broadband grant programs and explore what comes next. The 2009 Recovery Act included more than $7 billion to expand access to high-speed Internet services to close the digital divide and spark economic growth. Through our Broadband Technology Opportunities Program, NTIA invested about $4 billion of that in 230 projects across the country that have built critical network infrastructure, opened or upgraded public computer centers and established broadband adoption programs. And through our State Broadband Initiative Program, we invested another almost $300 million to help states collect broadband data for the National Broadband Map and expand their statewide broadband capacity. These investments are now enabling one-to-one computing programs and replacing old-fashioned textbooks with engaging online instructional materials in North Carolina classrooms. They are allowing Arkansas physicians to remotely examine patients located hundreds of miles away in far-flung rural corners of the state. They are supporting digital literacy training in low-income Latino communities across California. And they are bringing 4G LTE wireless broadband service to parts of the Navajo Nation that previously lacked even basic landline phone service. As of the end of 2013, our grantees had built or upgraded more than 112,000 miles of fiber -- enough to circle the earth four and a half times or get you halfway to the moon. They had connected more than 21,000 community anchor institutions, including about 8,000 K-12 schools, 1,300 libraries and 2,400 medical facilities. And they had established or upgraded 3,000 public computer centers and helped more than 600,000 households sign up for broadband. At the same time, our State Broadband Initiative Program has supported more than 200 local broadband planning teams across the country. So the question now is: where do we go from here? It’s a question that affects communities across the nation that are investing in broadband to ensure they have the advanced telecommunications infrastructure – and tech-savvy citizenry -- needed to drive growth, attract new businesses and remain competitive in the 21st Century economy.
benton.org/node/185087 | National Telecommunications and Information Administration
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NTCA: RURAL TELECOM PROVIDERS SEE 72% TAKE RATES ON BROADBAND
[SOURCE: telecompetitor, AUTHOR: Joan Engebretson]
Rural telecommunications providers continue to see gains in broadband availability, average broadband speeds and take rates, according to a survey of rural telecommunications members of NTCA-The Rural Broadband Association. The vast majority of the nation’s small rural telecommunications companies are NTCA members, and 27% of those members participated in the survey conducted in late 2013. Nearly two-thirds (65.5%) of respondents’ customers can receive broadband at speeds exceeding 10 Mbps, indicating that providers have made substantial progress in installing fiber to the home or to a neighborhood node to improve on the relatively slower rates that can be delivered over copper loops connecting the central office to the customer. Currently only about 8.5% of customers subscribe to service at rates above 10 Mbps, and the most popular category -- chosen by 34% of subscribers -- is between 3 and 4 Mbps. But as the NTCA notes in the report, “This gap should shrink as customers begin to realize all that can be accomplished online, and as new applications are developed which will require increased bandwidth.” One of the more impressive data points from NTCA’s survey is that respondents are seeing average broadband take rates of 72%, up from 69% in a similar survey conducted in 2013. Whenever one of the publicly held regional or Tier 2 telecommunications companies sees broadband take rates above 40% or so, some industry observers generally begin to question the remaining upside potential. But such concerns don’t seem to be merited yet in the rural telecom market, despite the high take rates.
benton.org/node/185064 | telecompetitor
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HOUSE TRIES TO BLOCK INTERNET SHIFT
[SOURCE: The Hill, AUTHOR: Cristina Marcos]
The House adopted a proposal to limit the Administration's ability to advance with plans to cede certain management of Internet domains. Passed 229-178, Rep. Sean Duffy's (R-WI) amendment to the 2015 Commerce-Justice-Science appropriations bill would prohibit the use of funds to relinquish the National Telecommunications and Information Administration's responsibility of assigning Internet domains.
benton.org/node/185105 | Hill, The
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REP LATTA INTRODUCES LEGISLATION TO KEEP INTERNET OPEN AND ACCESSIBLE
[SOURCE: US House of Representatives, AUTHOR: Press release]
Rep Bob Latta (R-OH) introduced legislation (HR 4752) to ensure the Internet remains open and free from government interference by limiting the Federal Communications Commission’s authority to regulate broadband under Title II of the Communications Act. The legislation comes after the FCC released a proposal to reclassify broadband Internet access under Title II as a telecommunications service rather than an information service. “In light of the FCC initiating yet another attempt to regulate the Internet, upending long-standing precedent and imposing monopoly-era telephone rules and obligations on the 21st Century broadband marketplace, Congress must take action to put an end to this misguided regulatory proposal,” said Rep Latta. “The Internet has remained open and continues to be a powerful engine fueling private enterprise, economic growth and innovation absent government interference and obstruction. My legislation will provide all participants in the Internet ecosystem the certainty they need to continue investing in broadband networks and services that have been fundamental for job creation, productivity and consumer choice.”
benton.org/node/185038 | US House of Representatives
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YOUTUBE STARTS RATING US ISPS, PUTS ITS WEIGHT BEHIND SETTLEMENT-FREE PEERING
[SOURCE: GigaOm, AUTHOR: Janko Roettgers]
Google released an US-focused version of its video quality report, which offers users a way to check which of their local Internet service providers (ISPs) deliver the best-looking YouTube streams. The report is singling out some ISPs as “HD verified” which YouTube Product Manager Jay Akkad defined this way: “If your provider can consistently deliver HD video, a resolution of at least 720p, without buffering or interruptions -- it’s HD Verified.” The report also shows which ISPs are capable of delivering SD quality video without buffering, and which ones deliver videos at a lower performance, or in other words will leave you completely frustrated. To get to these results, YouTube monitored streams over a 30-day period. Only ISPs that were capable of delivering HD at least 90 percent of the time are being called HD verified.
benton.org/node/185046 | GigaOm | ars technica
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HASTINGS: COMCAST WANTS TO BECOME THE 'POST OFFICE'
[SOURCE: USAToday, AUTHOR: Jessica Guynn]
Netflix CEO Reed Hastings continued to stump against Comcast's proposed acquisition of Time Warner Cable in an appearance at the Code Conference. Hastings accused Comcast of wanting to become the post office, a big national monopoly. Comcast CEO Brian Roberts took his own shots when he took the stage at the Code Conference, saying Netflix just does not want to bear the costs of the massive volume of Internet traffic that its subscribers generate. Netflix paid for postage to ship DVDs to subscribers, it should pay for traffic, Roberts said. "They used to spend three-quarters of a billion dollars for postage," Roberts said. “It’s a general way of taxing the internet,” Hastings said. “They want the whole internet to pay them for when their subscribers use the internet.” Netflix felt it had no choice to sign a paid peering deal with Comcast earlier this year, holding its nose as it did so in order to ensure that Netflix performance wouldn’t get even worse for Comcast subscribers. Not a lot of money is changing hands right now, but now that the threshold has been crossed, Hastings thinks that the fees will grow over time. “The fundamental question is who’s going to pay for the network? And the answer is the ISP,” Hastings said. Netflix makes up roughly 30 percent of US internet traffic on a given evening, which has led Comcast to suggest that Netflix should bear 30 percent of its costs, he said. And when he suggested that if that’s the case, maybe Netflix should get 30 percent of Comcast’s broadband revenue, Comcast demurred.
benton.org/node/185044 | USAToday | GigaOm
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UC2B MAKES DEAL TO WIDEN FIBER NETWORK
[SOURCE: News-Gazette, AUTHOR: Patrick Wade]
After more than a year in waiting, residents who committed hundreds of thousands of dollars toward the expansion of Urbana-Champaign Big Broadband finally have an answer about its future. During the next few years, officials, the network will be built out to the rest of the cities -- a crucial step forward in keeping the system afloat over the long run. And much as they envisioned, it will be a private company that comes in to do the work and provide the service. Family Video subsidiary iTV-3 will take over the operation, maintenance and customer service of what's now operating as UC2B. The network's 1,100 customers will be allowed to continue on their existing contracts if they choose. Moving forward, however, they will get their service from the private provider instead of UC2B. But the linchpin of the deal has bigger ambitions: iTV-3 also plans to build out the high-speed fiber network to neighborhoods where at least half of the residents agree to purchase a subscription. That means hard-wired and high-speed Internet, TV and voice connections to homes which can muster up support in their areas. Officials hope that, eventually, the high-speed fiber network will reach every home in the community. "It was articulated that that was what we would need to sustain this and grow this," said UC2B manager Sabrina Gosnell.
benton.org/node/185091 | News-Gazette | Federal Communications Commission
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VERIZON RESPONDS TO THE FCC: FIBER IS BETTER, EVEN FOR POTS
[SOURCE: Verizon, AUTHOR: Press release]
Verizon filed a response to opposition filed for our copper retirement in Ocean View (VA) and Belle Harbor (NY). As of April 2014, fewer than forty of Verizon’s customers in Ocean View and Belle Harbor remained on copper facilities. Customers in these two wire centers -- which cover more than 15,000 homes -- have already overwhelmingly made the decision to move to either Verizon’s fiber-based services or to competitors. Completing the migration to Verizon’s more advanced and reliable fiber facilities, and retiring the legacy copper loops and the switches in these wire centers, is not just a logical and efficient step, but it is also an incremental one. There has been no valid objection to the copper retirement filed by customers living or working in these areas or by providers serving them, and no request for an extension of time made. The claims raised by the very few commenters (none of which is specific to these two wire centers) have no merit under the circumstances here. Most of the customers remaining on copper-based services in these two wire centers today are purchasing plain old telephone service, or POTS. Following copper retirement, they will continue to receive the same traditional POTS service over fiber on the same terms and conditions and at the same or better price as they received over copper. There is no change in the underlying features and functionalities in their service: voice mail, collect calling, and other features will continue to work just as they did over copper; customers will continue to be able to use fax machines, medical monitoring devices, and home alarms; and accessibility services -- such as relay services used by customers who are deaf or hard of hearing -- also will continue to work as before. There will be no change to customers’ ability to call 911: public safety answering points will receive the same E911 information as before.
benton.org/node/185083 | Verizon
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VoIP IMPAIRMENT, FAILURE, AND RESTRICTIONS
[SOURCE: Broadband Internet Technical Advisory Group, AUTHOR: ]
A substantial portion of global voice communications are now carried over Internet Protocol (IP) and the Internet has become a fundamental medium supporting voice services. Voice over IP (VoIP) services allow users to make calls between IP-based endpoints, and to interconnect with the traditional public switched telephone network.
Impairment, failure, or restriction of VoIP services can create significant problems for users of those services, and can create problems for the operators of VoIP services, who may be required to troubleshoot or work around issues (where possible) to restore their users’ connectivity. As VoIP services become more common around the world, incidences of VoIP impairment, failure, or restriction also have the potential to be construed as anti-competitive, discriminatory, or motivated by non-technical factors. With this report BITAG clarifies how VoIP may be impaired, fail, or be restricted in residential, mobile, application provider, and consumer networks and devices; the methods for mitigating VoIP impairments, failures, or restrictions; and recommendations concerning such.
Among other things, the report recommends that:
Network operators should avoid impairing or restricting VoIP applications unless no reasonable alternatives are available to resolve technical issues.
VoIP-related Application Layer Gateways (ALGs) in operator-supplied home routers should minimize their impact on traffic other than the operator’s VoIP service where possible.
Manufacturers of home routers should disable VoIP-related ALGs by default.
Port blocking rules in consumer equipment should be user-configurable.
If network operators intentionally use network policies or practices that impair or restrict VoIP, they should provide disclosures about those policies and practices and provide communications channels for feedback.
Application developers should design VoIP applications to be port-agile where possible.
benton.org/node/185056 | Broadband Internet Technical Advisory Group
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SPECTRUM/WIRELESS
911 TEXTS
[SOURCE: New York Times, AUTHOR: Cathaleen Qiao Chen]
With eight of 10 Americans using their cellphones to send or receive text messages, some emergency response centers are updating their technology. Among them are centers in 12 Texas counties, hoping to accommodate situations in which calling 911 may be risky or impossible. The text-to-911 service is an early step in a national initiative to modernize the emergency call system. The initial deployment in Texas, where the service is available at 27 call centers for Verizon or T-Mobile users, is one of the largest so far in the country. Text-to-911 technology, which allows a user to send a text to 911, also makes emergency response more accessible to the deaf community. Phone calls remain the priority, officials said, because voice calls have better location-targeting capabilities. How common text-to-911 will be remains uncertain.
benton.org/node/185108 | New York Times
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CHAIRMEN UPTON AND WALDEN SEEK CLARIFICATION OF STATUTE TO ADVANCE WIRELESS BROADBAND
[SOURCE: House of Representatives Commerce Committee, AUTHOR: Press release]
House Commerce Committee Chairman Fred Upton (R-MI) and Communications and Technology Subcommittee Chairman Greg Walden (R-OR) wrote to Federal Communications Commission Chairman Tom Wheeler regarding the commission’s work on the spectrum provisions included in the Middle Class Tax Relief and Job Creation Act of 2012. Among those provisions is the requirement that the FCC work with stakeholders to streamline the approval process for upgrading existing wireless facilities. The committee leaders are writing seeking clarity on the rulemaking process and urging the chairman to act in a way that will accomplish the goals of the statute. In the letter to Chairman Wheeler, Reps Upton and Walden wrote, “We urge you to take swift action to clarify the terms of Section 6409(a) consistent with the intent of the statute to deliver the benefits of wireless broadband access to all Americans. To ensure that 6409(a) achieves its goal of streamlining the approval of eligible facilities requests the commission should adopt rules that provide consistency for applicants and reviewing authorities alike.” The leaders also expressed the urgency for the commission to identify ways to foster broadband infrastructure deployment.
benton.org/node/185085 | House of Representatives Commerce Committee | read the letter
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DEUTSCHE TELEKOM WILLING TO KEEP STAKE IN T-MOBILE-SPRINT TIE-UP
[SOURCE: Reuters, AUTHOR: ]
Kyodo news agency reported that Deutsche Telekom had agreed to a Softbank plan to buy T-Mobile. But sources familiar with the talks told Reuters that while the two sides are keen to get a deal done, a transaction was complicated, including the issue of getting regulatory approval. Germany’s Deutsche Telekom AG is willing to keep a minority stake in a deal to sell T-Mobile US to Japan’s Softbank, but other details such as price and financing remain to be worked out, according to sources familiar with the situation. Softbank owns a majority of Sprint, the third largest US wireless carrier. Deutsche Telekom owns 67 percent of T-Mobile, which has a market value of $27.6 billion and is the fourth-largest US wireless carrier.
benton.org/node/185052 | Reuters
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TELEVISION/RADIO
SINCLAIR PROPOSES SURRENDERING THREE LICENSES TO GAIN ALLBRITTON DEAL APPROVAL
[SOURCE: The Hill, AUTHOR: Kate Tummarello]
Broadcasting giant Sinclair is taking some of its local stations in Alabama and South Carolina off the air after the Federal Communications Commission actions in 2014 to keep broadcasters from sharing resources. In a recent filing with the FCC, Sinclair told the agency that it couldn’t find buyers for two stations in Birmingham (AL) and one station in Charleston (NC). Sinclair was supposed to sell those local broadcast stations as part of its nearly $1-billion deal to purchase stations from competitor Allbritton Communications. Sinclair outlined its plans for various moves so that no joint sales agreements or sharing agreements or financial ties would be involved in its purchase of the Allbritton stations, which has a closing deadline of July or either party can terminate the deal.
benton.org/node/185070 | Hill, The | Multichannel News
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STATEMENT OF COMMISSIONERS AJIT PAI AND MICHAEL O'RIELLY ON THE NEGATIVE IMPACT OF THE DECISION TO RESTRICT TELEVISION STATIONS' USE OF JOINT SALES AGREEMENTS
[SOURCE: Federal Communications Commission, AUTHOR: FCC Commissioner Ajit Pai, FCC Commissioner Michael O’Rielly]
When the Federal Communications Commission voted to restrict television broadcasters’ use of joint sales agreements (JSAs), we warned that this decision would lead to “less ownership diversity” and “more television stations going out of business.” Unfortunately, just two months later, this is coming to pass. Now, Sinclair Television Group announced its intent to surrender to the Commission for cancellation three television station licenses in the Charleston, South Carolina and Birmingham, Alabama markets. Sinclair reported that it was unable to find a viable buyer for any of these stations. As a result, it appears that these three stations will soon be going dark. So what has the Commission’s decision wrought? Instead of increasing the number of African-American-owned television stations, we are driving stations off the air. This will mean job losses, less service to South Carolinians and Alabamians, and less ownership diversity. We do not see how such an outcome possibly serves the public interest, and we hope that the Commission will take action immediately to correct its misguided restrictions on JSAs.
benton.org/node/185068 | Federal Communications Commission
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THE COMCAST WAY
[SOURCE: American Community Television, AUTHOR: Press release]
Simultaneous to projecting itself as a corporation that has the public’s best interest at heart in order to push through approval of the merger of Comcast with Time Warner, Comcast is waging war on Public, Educational and Government (PEG) access television in America’s heartland. On February 13, 2014, Comcast announced its merger with Time Warner, assuring regulators and the public that ultimately they would deliver a new and improved product that benefits consumers while not harming competition and consumer choices. In that same announcement, Comcast states “In every transaction, we have over-delivered on our public interest commitments.” Comcast states: “PEG channels would be protected from migration to digital in the acquired systems that are not yet all-digital (unless otherwise agreed by the LFA), and would be protected from material degradation.” “Making a concession to a digital transition of PEG channels, does us no good if those channels are stripped of their funding or reduced in number,” said Rocco. “As usual, Comcast shows open hostility toward PEG access television and shows its true colors when it comes to meeting the public interest.” There are over 40 PEG access operations in the state of Minnesota. American Community Television is monitoring the situation in Minnesota with interest.
benton.org/node/185058 | American Community Television
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PRIVACY/SECURITY
ROOT BACKDOOR FOUND IN SURVEILLANCE GEAR USED BY LAW ENFORCEMENT
[SOURCE: ars technica, AUTHOR: Dan Goodin]
Software used by law enforcement organizations to intercept the communications of suspected criminals contains a litany of critical weaknesses, including an undocumented backdoor secured with a hardcoded password, security researchers said. In a scathing advisory, the researchers recommended people stop using the Nice Recording eXpress voice-recording package. It is one of several software offerings provided by Ra’anana, Israel-based Nice Systems, a company that markets itself as providing "mission-critical lawful interception solutions to support the fight against organized crime, drug trafficking and terrorist activities." The advisory warned that critical weaknesses in the software expose users to attacks that compromise investigations and the security of the agency networks. "Attackers are able to completely compromise the voice recording/surveillance solution as they can gain access to the system and database level and listen to recorded calls without prior authentication," the researchers from security consultancy SEC Consult wrote. "Furthermore, attackers would be able to use the voice recording server as a jumphost for further attacks of the internal voice VLAN [virtual local area network], depending on the network setup."
benton.org/node/185089 | Ars Technica
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GOVERNMENT & COMMUNICATIONS
TCP CALLS FOR STRONG PUBLIC REPRESENTATIVE AT TERROR COURT
[SOURCE: The Constitution Project, AUTHOR: Press release]
A bipartisan group of national security and foreign intelligence experts, including a former judge who served on the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court, is urging the creation of a special advocate to protect the public's rights before the secretive terrorism review panel when the Senate takes up surveillance reform legislation. A report released by The Constitution Project's Liberty and Security Committee calls on Congress to create "meaningful adversarial participation" before the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court, or FISC, including a security-cleared special advocate with a specific mandate to represent the public's privacy and civil liberties interests whenever the government seeks broad surveillance authority. The new report suggests any effort by Congress to provide for more meaningful adversarial participation before the FISC should give the special advocate an unconditional right to participate in any case in which the FISC is asked to approve non-individual surveillance authorizations, including any production orders under section 215 of the USA Patriot Act or directives under section 702 of the FISA Amendments Act. The special advocate should also be empowered to represent all US persons who are subject to the broad surveillance orders, and should have the authority to litigate on their behalf.
benton.org/node/185060 | Constitution Project, The | read the report | The Hill
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JOURNALISM
HASHTAG JOURNALISM
[SOURCE: Columbia Journalism Review, AUTHOR: Ann Friedman]
[Commentary] Journalists have always covered “trending” topics. But in the pre-Twitter era, the trends weren’t algorithmically ranked. As activists have clamored to create and promote hashtags to draw attention to their issues -- so-called “hashtag activism” -- journalists have had to figure out when a Twitter trend merits news coverage. Or, in some cases, whether the hashtag is news in and of itself. Increasingly, they decide that it is. Slate described hashtag activism as a way “to divert public attention to new subjects.” And indeed, many of the news stories that have been subject to the efforts of hashtag activists have succeeded in redirecting the attention of both the public and reporters toward a previously more obscure angle. In some ways, journalists should be grateful for hashtag activism. The trending hashtag is a way to figure out what the public wants to discuss and learn more about -- with the added bonus that when journalists add more reporting and perspective to the conversation, their work gets duly hashtagged and receives an added boost. But in other ways, it’s just white noise. While hashtag activism is a good way to introduce a story or perspective into the mainstream news cycle, it doesn’t typically lead to sustained coverage of that story. Plus, Twitter itself is an incomplete picture of the public’s interests: As of 2013, only 18 percent of online adults were using it, but 58 percent of journalists were. But for activists who want to demand journalists’ attention en masse, Twitter is far and away the best forum today.
benton.org/node/185022 | Columbia Journalism Review
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LABOR
SILICON VALLEY DIVERSITY
[SOURCE: Bloomberg, AUTHOR: Peter Burrows]
Google’s decision to lay bare its lack of diversity ramps up the pressure on other Silicon Valley companies to increase the number of women and minorities among technology workers. Google’s disclosure follows increasing calls from investors and activists for companies in the technology hub -- which prides itself on being liberal and culturally inclusive -- to embrace diversity. “Silicon Valley has been confused on the idea of meritocracy.” Said Mitch Kapor, the former chief executive officer of Lotus. He’s organizing a conference on diversity with Google later this year. “Aspirationally, it’s a meritocracy, but in practice it really isn’t.” The lack of diversity among Google’s 50,000 employees isn’t unusual. In 2013, 74 percent of U.S. workers in computer and mathematical occupations were men, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. In software development, a fifth of the jobs were held by women.
benton.org/node/185102 | Bloomberg
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GOOGLE, SILICON VALLEY MUST DO MORE TO HIRE FEMALE ENGINEERS
[SOURCE: Washington Post, AUTHOR: Vivek Wadhwa]
[Commentary] The technology industry has been fighting hard not to reveal race and gender diversity data -- especially for its engineering teams -- because it has a lot to be embarrassed about. Data collected on Github showed that the percentage of female engineers at Qualcomm’s development center in Austin was 5.5 percent. At Dropbox it’s 6.3 percent, at Yelp 8.3 percent, at Airbnb 13.2 percent and 14.4 percent at Pinterest. Google just revealed that 17 percent of its technology staff is female. That is impressive compared with the rest of Silicon Valley, but not once you put it in the context of the available pool of female computer scientists. In 1987, some 37 percent of the graduating computer-science class was female. But, because of the unfair hurdles they face, women are getting discouraged from studying computer science, and the percentage had dropped to 18 percent by 2012. Nonetheless, about a quarter of the pool of highly-experienced software developers is female. A company such as Google -- which has its choice of new graduates as well as of experienced engineers -- should therefore have far greater diversity. Technology companies need to rethink the way they recruit. They need to look at how jobs are defined so that they don’t exclude women, who have a tendency, unlike males, to pass up opportunities for which they don’t have the exact skills. They need to look beyond the usual recruitment grounds by interviewing from universities where there are high proportions of women and minorities, as well as at conferences that women engineers attend, such as the Grace Hopper Celebration of Women in Computing and Women 2.0. They need to insist that, for every job opening, at least one woman and minority member be interviewed, and that the interviewing committee be diverse. And they need to make sure that the hiring is for competency rather than for credentials. [Wadhwa is a fellow at the Rock Center for Corporate Governance at Stanford University and director of research at the Center for Entrepreneurship and Research Commercialization at Duke’s engineering school]
benton.org/node/185026 | Washington Post
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STORIES FROM ABROAD
GOOGLE BOWS TO EU PRIVACY RULING
[SOURCE: Financial Times, AUTHOR: Richard Waters]
Google, bowing a European Court of Justice decision, is introducing a mechanism that could lead to large amounts of private information being stripped from the widely used search service. An online form, available from May 30, will give anyone in Europe an easy way to ask the US company to censor links to other Internet sites that they think contain outdated and damaging information about them. The company hopes to strike a balance between blocking damaging private information about ordinary Europeans while preserving links to things in the public interest, such as articles about corrupt public officials. In a mark of its new stance on Europe, the search company also plans on May 30 to announce a committee largely made up of outside experts to hold hearings in Europe and advise it on how to deal with its new privacy responsibilities. Headed by Eric Schmidt, Google’s chairman, and David Drummond, general counsel, members of the committee will include Jimmy Wales, head of Wikipedia, along with academics and former data regulators from a number of European countries.
Anyone wanting Google to remove links to information about them will have to report three things on the company’s new online form: the URL of the offending material, their home country, and an explanation of why they think the links should disappear. Google says it will examine every request against the criteria laid down by the court -- employing humans, not algorithms, to make the judgments. Links are due to start disappearing after the middle of June. The excisions will only be made from Google’s European sites, since most searches are local. If Google doesn’t agree with the request or cannot decide, complaints will have to be taken to national data protection agencies, who are preparing for what could become a deluge of requests.
benton.org/node/185110 | Financial Times | FT – reaction | FT – How To | FT – Page | | Bloomberg | Recode | NYT – Not That Easy
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